Bexleyheath

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Template:Infobox London place Bexleyheath, formerly known as "Bexley New Town", part of the London Borough of Bexley, consists of a suburban development located 12 miles (19.3 km) east-south-east of Charing Cross.

The modern town area of today features a bingo-hall, cinema, hotel, magistrates' court, reference library, six-a-side football centre and ten-pin bowling alley (Megabowl) among the more usual retail outlets. Four bus routes link the town to a railway station on the line between Blackheath and Dartford. Some facilities at the eastern end of the town centre, however, lie closer to Barnehurst railway station, also connected by scheduled buses. A substantial section of Broadway has become pedestrianised to upgrade conditions for shoppers and to respond to the competition from the Bluewater shopping centre in nearby Dartford.

In 1859 architect Philip Webb designed a house, Red House, for the artist, reforming designer and socialist William Morris on the western edge of the heath, in the hamlet of Upton, before it became largely developed as a London suburb. Red House forms an early essay in a romantically-massed, non-historical, brick-and-tile domestic vernacular style; it has diverse windows and an extravagant stairway. The National Trust acquired the house in 2003.

Alfred Bean, railway engineer and one-time owner of Danson House, furthered the development of Bexleyheath as a London suburb by championing the Bexleyheath Line in the 1880s to support the growth of the estates around Danson Park.

The famous singer Kate Bush was born here.

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